343 Industries today released the trailer for the upcoming second episode for Halo 4 Spartan Ops. For those who don’t know, Spartan Ops is the episodic co-op campaign that sends players on missions that are tied-in to animated episodes of a story that takes place six months after the end of the story in Halo 4. The episodes and the five missions that accompany each episode are free to those who purchased Halo 4. Spartan Ops takes the place of previous games’ Firefight co-op mode, which was a wave-based survival mode.

This week’s episode will feature a bit of mystery, as a mysterious artifact is brought aboard a UNSC ship. From the video description:

The mysterious artifact recovered from Requiem takes control of vital systems on board the UNSC Infinity, forcing the Spartans of Crimson and Majestic back down to the planet to look for a way to free the ship.

Hmm. A mysterious artifact brought aboard a spaceship? The scientists are enamored of it? It takes control of the ship? Besides that one episode of every space-faring sci-fi series ever, this story sounds suspiciously similar to the background story of the original Dead Space. Perhaps 343 is taking the Halo series in the survival-horror direction. We’ll all find out on Monday, when episode 2 of Spartan Ops is released.